ANAHEIM, Calif. — It was yet another game where the Angels let it slip away in the late innings on Monday night.
Holding onto a 4-3 lead in the ninth inning, right-hander Kirby Yates blew the save, and a pair of close plays at the plate in extra innings didn’t go the Angels’ way in their 5-4 loss against the Astros.
“We didn’t get it done tonight,” Angels manager Kurt Suzuki said. “Plain and simple.”
Yates, still searching for his 100th career save, walked Jeremy Peña to leadoff the ninth inning, who then stole second base to set up Christian Walker’s two-strike single to score the tying run.
“I can’t walk the leadoff guy there, and I did,” Yates said. “There’s two pitches I want back, and it’s the 3-2 (pitch to Peña), and it’s the pitch to Walker.”
Yates’ ERA on the season is now 5.23, and he has blown two saves.
“It seems like every time I pitch, I’ve got to stand here and talk about it,” Yates said. “It’s usually not a good thing when you’re in the bullpen. It’s frustrating. Look, my job is to get three outs at the end of the game, right? I haven’t been doing that. And, kind of got to bite the bullet and take it on the chin, but it’s not always easy.”
The Angels’ bullpen’s 13 blown saves this season are tied for the fourth-most in baseball, and they have only had two saves since designating Jordan Romano for assignment on April 6. The last time an Angel recorded a save was Yates on May 23.
“We have to evaluate it,” Suzuki said on who will be closer moving forward. “Definitely, we have to go back and see what gives us the best chance to win, for sure.”
There are other candidates who are pitching well and could take over the closing role, such as right-handers Sam Bachman and Chase Silseth, but they haven’t gotten the chance yet this season.
“We signed him to be our closer, and we were going to give him a chance to close,” Suzuki said on the decision to go with Yates to close on Monday. “We did feel like his stuff was ticking up, and he’s been doing really well this year against right-handers. Just didn’t get it done tonight.”
Then, in the 10th inning, Brice Matthews singled on a bunt that was about to roll into foul territory, but Denzer Guzman picked it up to try and make the play, making it first and third with no outs.
Jake Meyers then hit a pop-up to Nick Madrigal just beyond the infield dirt in shallow center field. Jose Altuve tagged up from third and tried to score, and was successful, because Madrigal’s throw to the plate was a one-hop that Logan O’Hoppe couldn’t handle.
O’Hoppe was charged with an error on the play.
“I tried to create some space on the hop,” O’Hoppe said. “It ate me up. It was in between. He was further down the line than I thought. Plays at the plate are usually bang-bang plays. I made the best read that I thought with the information I had. It’s a punch in the face, for sure.”
It’s been a tough season for O’Hoppe, to say the least. He’s hitting .194 with a .554 OPS and grades poorly among most defensive metrics.
“You give everything in this game, and it takes more than it gives,” O’Hoppe said. “I’m pretty sick to my stomach about it and pissed off. I’ve been pissed off for a while about how things have been going defensively. I’ve been working my ass off to fix it, and it’s just really frustrating.”
In the bottom half of the 10th, Jose Siri hit a line drive into left field, and Mike Trout tried to score from second base, but was gunned down at the plate by a perfect throw from Matthews. The Angels challenged the play for blocking the plate, but the call was confirmed.
Jo Adell struck out, and Guzman flew out to left to leave Siri stranded at second base to end the game.
A positive note for the Angels was that this game was a step in the right direction for right-hander Grayson Rodriguez.
The right-hander’s return to a big league mound after missing a year and a half due to various injuries has been shaky, but Rodriguez delivered an outing good enough to give the Angels a chance to win.
Rodriguez pitched 5 ⅓ innings while allowing three runs, with two of them earned, on six hits and struck out six batters.
Rodriguez’s success stemmed from getting ahead in counts early and getting whiffs on his secondary offerings.
He primarily used his fastball to start hitters and landed it for a strike 10 out of 14 times. Rodriguez got hitters to swing and miss at 33% of the swings against his changeup and 40% of the swings against his slider.
“I think we definitely took a step forward there,” Rodriguez said. “We really worked on that since the last start, being able to get change-ups in the zone, curveballs and sliders as well. Threw some really good sliders tonight. That and my curveball, I think, if I can have those working together, I can pitch a lot deeper into ballgames. Thankfully, the slider was a lot better, and so was the change-up.”
Rodriguez cruised through five innings of work, with the only blemish coming from an unearned run in the third inning when Trout had a ball hit off his glove at the warning track to allow Yordan Alvarez to reach second and then score on Walker’s RBI double. Had Trout caught that ball, it would’ve ended a one-two-three inning.
In the sixth, Rodriguez ran into trouble. He faced four batters and allowed three doubles for a pair of runs to score to tie the game, and that was the end of the night for him.
“Really kicking myself over what happened in the sixth inning. The team was playing too well at that point for me to go out there and do that. I’m going to have a tough time sleeping at night over that sixth inning.”
